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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/26624209">Lies Coming True</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/Malvolia/pseuds/Malvolia'>Malvolia</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Anastasia (1997), Anastasia - Flaherty/Ahrens/McNally</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>F/M</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-09-24</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-09-24</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-18 09:48:40</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>General Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>2</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>2,725</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/26624209</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/Malvolia/pseuds/Malvolia</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Dmitry had spent his life as an invisible nobody, until Anya came and complicated things. But maybe she had been complicating it longer than he knew; and maybe there was a way to disappear again...together.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Dimitri | Dmitry/Anya | Anastasia Romanov (Anastasia 1997 &amp; Broadway)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>4</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>37</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>1. One in a Crowd of Thousands</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Dmitry had become an expert at staying invisible. In the post-revolutionary era, it was the best way to keep from disappearing entirely. Second best would be to join the party, serve as an obedient comrade, and perform just short of excellent service.</p><p>Excellence could make you disappear faster than incompetence.</p><p>"Just get by," his father used to say. "Don't stand out one way or another. Just get by."</p><p>After his father's failure to follow his own advice landed him in a prison camp, just getting by became all Dmitry aimed for in life. There had only been one time he had ever wanted to be anything but nondescript, and that had been a fleeting impulse, likely brought on by the effects of sun and heat on a child's brain.</p><p>Paris in spring was not St. Petersburg in summer, but he was feeling lightheaded again every time a man turned and surveyed Anya with open appreciation. It made him surly.</p><p>"We're drawing too much attention," he muttered to Vlad.</p><p>The older man glanced up and watched someone tilt his hat to Anya.</p><p>"Oh, I don't think <em> we </em> are."</p><p>Anya smiled at something another restaurant patron said to her, and Dmitry slouched back into his chair, scowling.</p><p>"And this is <em> before </em> she's recognized as the Grand Duchess," Vlad said mildly.</p><p>Dmitry stood up, almost knocking over his chair. Anya glanced over, startled. "I'll be back at the hotel," he announced. "I'm not hungry."</p><p>"You? Not hungry?" Her eyebrows almost met. "You'd tell us if you were dying, wouldn't you?"</p><p>"Ha," he grunted. "Just...try to keep a low profile."</p><p>As he walked the few blocks back to their hotel, he turned his hat in his hands, worrying the brim. It was a risky thing to do when he only had one stylish hat. He wasn't like the other well-dressed men walking the streets of Paris, sure of their meals and where they would sleep for months and years ahead. While the sale of Anya's diamond had provided them with enough money to outfit themselves for the rest of the plan, and a little more besides, he didn't want to take anything more from her than he needed.</p><p>Dmitry wasn't anything special. He had worked very hard not to be.</p><p> </p><p>That night, he lay on his back for hours after he should have been asleep, doing what he could to push Anya out of his thoughts. Unlike him, she seemed born to stand out in a crowd. It made her perfect for this con. Sometimes he almost forgot they were only pretending she was a grand duchess. In a few short days, they would doubtless convince the Dowager Empress herself, and then...</p><p>He rolled over and punched his pillow into better shape. Well, and then they would all go their separate ways. Vlad obviously intended to stay with his countess, if he could convince her to have him, and she was obviously eager to be convinced. Anya would be part of a family again, and what did it really matter if she were Anastasia or not? Family didn't always mean blood. She would make him...that is, make the Dowager Empress very happy.</p><p>His heart wasn't going to break, no matter what Vlad said. Hearts got hard on the streets of Leningrad, and a few weeks with this woman wasn't enough to change that.</p><p>Paris was too rich for him, too full of the land of yesterday and foolish dreams. He needed a new start, a tomorrow worth making, and for that he set his sights on America. He'd been studying English secretly for years, not wanting to be confined to expatriate communities if he could help it. America had lots of room for creative thinkers, or so the rumors went.</p><p>In America he could disappear by his own choice, in his own way.</p><p>Dmitry was wondering if he could pay his passage to New York by taking work on a ship when the screaming started. His feet hit the floor before Anya had time to draw breath to scream again, and not long after she did Dmitry burst through the door of her room, eyes darting around for intruders before resting on her, standing in the middle of the room with wild eyes, terrified but safe.</p><p>It was a nightmare, apparently. He took hold of her and led her back to her bed, seating himself next to her when she insisted he stay. She clung to his arms like anchors in a storm. He wanted to pull her close, hold her more securely, but she was doing well enough this way, and he didn't want to make her feel he was taking advantage of her distress.</p><p>Besides, although they'd slept in close proximity in the course of this journey to Paris, and it wasn't the first time he'd seen her in pajamas, Vlad had always been there, too. And although she had hit him in one arm or another before, it had always been the briefest of contact, and he had always been wearing sleeves. Gently, he adjusted his arms so that her hands slid down them, coming to rest in his.</p><p>Her hands were rough, and clammy, and he didn't want her to let go. So when he saw her realize she was still holding him, he let go first.</p><p>"Do you really think...I might be her?"</p><p>The blue of her eyes reminded him forcibly of that unforgettable June day, and he knew he didn't want the discovery of the grand duchess to be a con, that he had never wanted it to be a con. "I want to believe you’re the little girl I saw once, many years ago."</p><p>The boy Dmitry hadn't cared much either way about parades, but he had loved the crowds that gathered to meet them. With everybody jostling each other for the best view, nobody cared about one scrawny kid, or noticed when he jostled the wallets right out of their pockets.</p><p>But at this particular parade, when he had glanced towards the road to make sure no guards had spotted him at work, he saw a girl in a carriage, sitting as proud and serene as a monarch. He forgot he wasn't there to watch; he couldn't take his eyes off her. It must be the Grand Duchess Anastasia, only two years younger than he was. How could somebody so young command so much attention?</p><p>Suddenly, he wanted her eyes on him, too. He began running after the carriage, calling her name, shoving past cheering people. He reached out a hand...for what, he never could explain afterwards.</p><p>Until tonight, with Anya, when she held his hand and it felt like a piece falling into place. He had only felt like that once before, when Anastasia had smiled at him, a smile that knocked all of his cavalier attitudes towards royalty away and left him bowing low in her direction. (Dmitry left the bow out of his retelling--that, and his irrelevant past and present personal feelings.)</p><p>Anya smiled wistfully. "You’re making me feel I was there, too."</p><p>"Maybe you were," he said, and he wished with all his heart that she was, that all of the lies he had told her would come true. "Make it part of your story."</p><p>"I was in a parade, passing through the city," she began. He nodded encouragement. "It was a hot day...no clouds." True enough, but true of enough June days in St. Petersburg that she could just be embellishing.</p><p>"Thousands of people lined the roads, and out of those thousands of people, a boy caught my eye."</p><p>Dmitry's stomach clenched. This was one of his most secret, precious memories, yet when she told the other side, it sounded so ridiculous. Of course he would remember a princess noticing him, a little nobody. Why should Anya make this part of her story? Why should Anastasia have remembered him even until the end of the parade, much less over a decade later?</p><p>"He was thin," she continued, adding with a slight grin, "and not too clean."</p><p>He forced an answering grin. Her story would work. She could be describing any of the hundreds of boys there that day.</p><p>"There were guards, but he dodged them." A nice flourish; he hadn't mentioned that part, but of course any royal parade had guards. She caught his eye and held it. "In a crowd of thousands, he made himself...<em> seen.</em>"</p><p>Warmth flooded Dmitry, from his head to his toes. He had the sense that Anya wasn't talking about the boy in St. Petersburg at all, or at least not only the boy. Here in Paris, surrounded by so many glittering opportunities and noisy entertainments, she looked at him in the quiet darkness and she <em> saw </em> him. <em> Him.</em> He had a sudden desperate desire to kiss her, and the shock of it froze him in place.</p><p>Her expression changed, as though she were trying to recall the details he had told her, to pull them into her narrative. She pushed up from the bed and walked slowly across the room. "He started to run; he was calling my name over and over. I was trying so hard to be imperious, but it was impossible. I smiled at him..." Anya froze. "And then...he bowed."</p><p>Dmitry jumped off the bed, speaking before he could stop himself. "I didn't tell you that."</p><p>"You didn't have to," she said, awe stamped across her face. "I remember."</p><p>He was running towards her again, as he had when he was a boy, except tonight she ran towards him, too.</p><p>"I found you," he breathed.</p><p>"But this time, I found <em> you </em> first."</p><p>They held each other and still moved closer, impossibly closer, and she was seeing him for everything he was, and he was seeing...</p><p>The Grand Duchess Anastasia Nikolaevna Romanova of Russia.</p><p>He knelt down. "Your Highness."</p><p>She reached a hand to him. Dmitry, I..."</p><p>He rose slowly and backed towards the door.  "You need your sleep. We both do. We have a big day tomorrow, presenting you to the Dowager Empress."</p><p>"You expect I can sleep now? Can you?"</p><p>"I don't matter."</p><p>"That's..."</p><p>"Good night, Your Majesty."</p><p>As he was closing the door, she yelled, "If you really believe I'm royalty, you should stop telling me what to do!"</p><p>Dmitry leaned his forehead against the door, waiting for cold reality to settle in again. Princesses didn't marry con men.</p><p>He mentally filed the look on Anya's face when she reassured him he was seen next to the smile on Anastasia's face when she saw him from the carriage. Equally precious memories. The same unattainable person. He took a deep breath and turned back to his room.</p><p>Life had been much simpler when he was invisible.</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0002"><h2>2. One Loyal Subject</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <span>"I hate you for that."</span>
</p><p>
  <span>None of her infuriated ranting later as she packed in the hotel room had hit home like those cold words delivered outside the Dowager Empress' theatre box. They lodged in his brain, chasing themselves around and around, blurring his memories of a bright June afternoon when he was ten, and a quiet moment in the darkness a few nights ago.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He deserved to be hated. He had used her, honing her potential without letting her in on the trick. He had known from the beginning that she would never have agreed to lie, even to save her own neck.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>It made it easier to leave. He didn't know how he could've gone if they had been on good terms, and he had to go.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Anya was safe and wanted with her grandmother, finally home where she belonged. It was time he found his own place to belong.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He heard the clatter of heels running on pavement, and his heart sank. He barely needed to look over his shoulder to verify it was exactly who he thought it was. He had lingered too long brooding on the bridge; he could have been at the train station an hour ago.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>"If you ever see me from a carriage again," he said, trying without much success to keep his voice light, "don’t wave, don’t smile." He hadn't meant to say anything more, but he owed her the truth behind his departure. "I don’t want to be in love with someone I can’t have for the rest of my life. Goodbye, Your Majesty."</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He bowed towards her, sorry but by no means apologetic, and reached for his suitcase.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Anya, radiantly out-of-place in a startlingly red dress, stepped towards him.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>"I always dreamed my first kiss would be in Paris with a handsome prince."</span>
</p><p>
  <span>His heart hammered, but he refused to allow himself to take advantage of the moment. "I’m not your prince, Anya."</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She swept across the bridge, straight and proud as a queen. She overturned his suitcase and stood on it, gazing down on him with eyes blazing with certainty.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>"The Grand Duchess Anastasia Romanov would care to disagree," she said, and then her face and voice softened as she spoke a name he hadn't been called in years: "Dima."</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She reached for him, and he couldn't resist her any more than if she had issued a royal command. As far as he was concerned, she had; and she had one loyal subject in Paris.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>When they broke apart, he lifted her gently down. "I'd question your taste," he said, "but I wouldn't want to be accused of treason."</span>
</p><p>
  <span>"Very wise."</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He kissed her again, to make sure he really could. She shivered, and though he flattered himself enough to believe that was partly to do with him, he also caught the hint of cold in the air as the sun set.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>"We should get you back," he said, and laughed as she went rigid and opened her mouth to argue. "For a coat, at least."</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She nodded. "And my luggage."</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He picked up his own and offered her his arm. "Where are you going?"</span>
</p><p>
  <span>"I don't know. Where were you planning on going without me?"</span>
</p><p>
  <span>"The coast, then working to pay my way to America."</span>
</p><p>
  <span>"Would you allow me to pay for a stateroom, instead?"</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He shook his head. "Your grandmother...your family..."</span>
</p><p>
  <span>A shadow crossed her face. "I can't stay. Nana knows. We can't escape the revolution by spending the rest of our lives with people who are trying to pretend the grand imperial heyday never ended."</span>
</p><p>
  <span>"The rest of </span>
  <em>
    <span>our</span>
  </em>
  <span> lives?" He didn't trust himself to say anything more without exploding with happiness.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She hit him in the arm. "Don't back out on me now, Dima. Unless all that talk of love was academic."</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He set his suitcase down so he could take both of her hands. "I want to be in love with you for the rest of my life. Will you let me?"</span>
</p><p>
  <span>"Even if we'll have terrible arguments?"</span>
</p><p>
  <span>"Oh, there's no 'if' about it." He smiled as confidently as he could, but she frowned.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>"I said some horrible things to you."</span>
</p><p>
  <span>"True," he replied, "but you're doing extremely well at making up for them. Unless you really do hate me for making you lie."</span>
</p><p>
  <span>"You tried to make me lie, but it didn't work. It all turned out to be true. And I know you'll be an honest man from here on out."</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He placed a hand to his heart, and she covered it with one of hers.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>"I truly don't hate you; not even a little bit." She rested her head against his chest. "I want you to be in love with me, to have me for the rest of your life. Because I want to have you for the rest of mine."</span>
</p><p>
  <span>"And because you don't hate me?"</span>
</p><p>
  <span>"Not even a little bit."</span>
</p><p>
  <span>"So you..."</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She grabbed him by the lapels and pulled him off-balance into a kiss.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>"Of course I love you, idiot."</span>
</p><p>
  <span>Dmitry reclaimed her arm, and his suitcase, and they moved along the street together.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>"You know," he said, "maybe the only thing more romantic than a first kiss in Paris would be having the captain of an ocean liner perform your wedding ceremony."</span>
</p><p>
  <span>"Mmm," Anya hummed thoughtfully. "There's only one way to find out for sure."</span>
</p><p>
  <span>She leaned her head on his shoulder, and he walked tall and serene, feeling every bit a prince.</span>
</p><p>
  <span>He loved her for that.</span>
</p>
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